Digital Distribution CEO: Publishers Are Scared of DRM-less Games

Are video game publishers afraid to operate in a DRM-free environment?

They are, according to Michal Kicinski, CEO of digital distribution company CD Projekt and its GOG (Good Old Games) service. Kicinski told gamesindustry.biz:

We're trying to convince [game publishers] there is nothing to be afraid of. DRM-free, that is something they are really scared of, but on the other hand we can say 'all of those games are available pirated widely so it's better to sell them for small money than make the customer's life difficult and get some more revenues'.

 

...I think that if somebody is paying for the game then they deserve own it, not with a certain list of conditions and sometimes the list of conditions can be long... DRM makes customer's lives too complicated, and this is usually because of some corporate ideas, policies and trying to be smart, too smart, in how to get customers and how to keep them and no let them go somewhere else. We are believers in the free market and bringing freedom to customers.

 

Piracy in Poland is always much, much bigger here than in Western countries so we got used to living with piracy and we grew up in a surrounding where there was no help from governments to actually fight piracy. So we had to learn to compete with pirates...

GP: To be candid, I was not aware of GoG until I checked it out for this post. It's apparently not live yet, but is supposed to start up this month. And they've got Fallout and Fallout 2 displayed. I've been wanting to replay those with the new Fallout 3 coming out soon...